Pussyfooting Around
by Fishpony
Summary: A demigod trying to be normal is like a mountain lion pretending to be a house cat


**Disclaimer: I do not own PJO**

Cartesian Sultzer's Guide to Staying Alive and Mediocre after Summer Ends

The progression of the year is reversed. It's in the summer that you work your butt off. It's in the July heat when you struggle and strain to advance. If you don't make it through the summer, well let's just say you didn't have to deal with the rest of the year. Or life for that matter. So it was evident that you should then cruise through the school year. Relish your months of normalcy and try to be as unpretentious as possible.

_Nota bene: If you attract attention you will attract monsters. Do not under any circumstances prove yourself to be anything more than an (exceptionally) smart seventh grader._

This includes avoiding those who willingly and ostentatiously attract monsters. These individuals include but are not limited to:

Jubilee Kirkpatrick- A reckless individual who adamantly believes in the saying, _"Veni, vidi, vici"_

Mary Jane Hoffman- A narcissistic individual who feels the need to prove herself as a hero worthy of Heracles recognition

To abstain from being messily decapitated/eaten/cursed/dismembered it is best to shun anything mythological. That being said, it is recommended that research be done on Greek and Roman mythology so you know what you're shunning. Additionally, it is plain common sense that you do not read books on this subject in class. Every teacher could easily be a monster looking for a sign to kill you. Do not trigger its primal urges.

_Nota bene: No bit of myth is unimportant. Do not skip earlier myths, do not skip latter myths, and make sure to read the Iliad, Odyssey, and Aeneid in their entirety._

However, it is not suggested that in order to behave like an ordinary adolescent that you must shun the gods. Such action could lead to vaporization/being cursed/spontaneous combustion/ having a monster siced on you. This is of course, contradictory to the purpose of this guide.

* * *

The guide had been a work of genius. A copy of it was taped on the inside of every one of his notebooks and binders as a reminder to him. That was particularly helpful, he needed all the encouragement he could get to stay away from afore mentioned individuals. Really, the only time he ever saw them was at camp or at school. At camp they weren't a problem, great to have on your capture the flag team in fact. At school when you're trying to remain bland and flavorless they would come over and try to dump hot fudge on you, changing your color to a dark and unappealing shade _and_ speeding up the melting process.

The only problem with the guide was that it forbade him to go to Jubilee and/or Mary Jane, not the other way around. The two of them wouldn't follow any rules Cartesian gave them. Mary Jane would laugh in his face and Jubilee would probably eat her copy.

"Now, students. Open up your textbooks to page 324 and complete problems 1-28 in silence. You may use your notes for this lesson," Mrs. Adrovel (also known as Mrs. Drivel by more malicious classmates) said. Cartesian had been monitoring her for the past few weeks and had come to the conclusion that there was nothing monstrous about her. No horns, no additional appendages, and no unusual cannibalistic eating habits.

He opened up his textbook and considered the problems at hand. Twenty-eight fairly straight forward problems with matrices. He erased some lewd comments from the margins of the page and started to work. Math was simple. Math was _easy_. Math was respected. Nobody cared how well you analyzed a chapter of To Kill a Mockingbird, or if you knew the theme in A Tell-Tale Heart. People realized that in the end, no one's going to be reading Animal Farm for their job but people do need mathematicians (not to be confused with magicians or morticians) to solve life's algebraic problems.

In other words, Cartesian loved math.

He had just finished problem number eight when someone kicked the leg of his chair. His head jerked backwards and hit the graphitized wood with a crack. His hand flew to the throbbing bump at the base of his skull. His eyes flitted about wildly until finally focusing on the pencil sharpener and the girl standing there.

"What's the answer to number two?" She staged whispered, twirling her hair around her pencil. The curls were so light they were almost undistinguishable to the wood of the pencil.

Cartesian rubbed his head, "You and I both know that asking is just a technicality, you don't have to ask."

Mary Jane rolled her eyes, "I'm not a mind reader. Well, not really. Anyway, no one else is doing the work so I might as well ask you. So what's the answer and why are you so obsessed with a piece of paper?"

Cartesian felt his face turning red, "I thought you said you can't read minds," he hissed.

"I can't. So when happiness about paper fuses with your soul you're either in a comic book or obsessed."

A dark haired girl at least a head taller than both of them got behind Mary Jane in the nonexistent line for the pencil sharpener. She grinned, "If you like a piece of paper so much why don't you _marry_ it?"

"Oh, hi Jubilee. Everyone knows that you're guaranteed to show up and make things that much better," not only did this go against the majority of the guide's principles it also meant that Cartesian had only five minutes to complete twenty problems. This wouldn't have been an issue if two girls weren't breathing down his neck for answers.

Jubilee turned to Mary Jane, "Is he telling you what you want to know?"

"Nope."

"Then I guess we'll have to do it the hard way," Jubilee cracked her knuckles. Her name led to some irony and multiple long stories. To paraphrase, it was a Kirkpatrick family tradition that the first born of every generation was a boy. Jubilee was the first born of her generation so her mother had cried "Jubilation!" out of joy. The irony comes from the fact that Jubilee has pretty much given everyone she meets everything _but_ happiness and joy.

"Mr. Sultzer, we all know that Ms. Kirkpatrick and Ms. Hoffman are very attractive young ladies but please turn your attention back to math class," Mrs. Adrovel reprimanded.

Through the laughter that followed Cartesian took a mental oath to call her Mrs. Drivel from now on, "I was just, telling them that they'll have great careers in the future."

Jubilee returned to her seat, shooting a bemused look back at him. Mary Jane winked, "As strippers!"

**AN: Hooray for three shots! This was written for Karma's Inferno's Original Cliche Challenge. Let us list the cliches:**

**Three demigods**

**One of them is a child of the Big Three (Oh come on, you can figure it out)**

**There will be a small quest. When I say small I literally mean around the neighberhood**

**They have funky names**


End file.
